Jolie and Pitt, known collectively as "Brangelina," were one of the entertainment world's most visible couples, due to their good looks, successful films and activism.

They married in 2014 after 10 years together.

Jolie, 41, who won a best-supporting actress Oscar for Girl, Interrupted in 2000, was previously married to actors Jonny Lee Miller and Billy Bob Thornton.

Pitt, 52, one of Hollywood's leading men, was married to actress Jennifer Aniston in 2003 when he and Jolie began filming Mr & Mrs Smith, the story of two professional killers who have unknowingly been assigned to kill each other.

There were reports of an affair during that time, but Jolie told Vogue magazine they were only "very, very good friends" until Pitt and Aniston split in 2005.

Jolie, the estranged daughter of actor Jon Voight, had a bohemian reputation early in her career but more recently has taken on humanitarian causes and was named a special envoy for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.

She frequently visited countries such as Afghanistan, Sudan, Tanzania, Iraq and Jordan to call attention to the plight of refugees and the underprivileged.

Pitt joined Jolie on some of her trips and started a foundation to finance reconstruction of homes in New Orleans after the city was flooded by Hurricane Katrina.

Together they started the Jolie-Pitt Foundation in 2006 to help charities worldwide.

Their children include sons adopted from Cambodia and Vietnam and a daughter adopted from Ethiopia.

To encourage other women to explore their options, Jolie spoke out publicly about her elective surgeries in 2013 and 2015 to have her breasts, ovaries and fallopian tubes removed as a preventive measure due to a family history of cancer.

In addition to her Oscar win, Jolie was nominated for an Academy Award for Changeling in 2008.

She also starred in two Lara Croft action films, The Good Shepherd, A Mighty Heart and The Tourist.